Back In The Day

Frank’s post on the show at The Charter Oak Cultural Center got me thinking about CT underground music. A turnout of 20 is indeed a disappointment, especially given the quality of bands and venue. So I wonder.

Back in the early to mid 90’s (or “back in the day”, to add that generation-privileger) CT featured a thriving underground music scene. The number of hardcore, ska, and punk bands was almost absurd. Every kid toting a trumpet or trombone to high school was starting a ska band (myself included), and individual clubs (e.g., Studio 158, Tune Inn, The Boiler Room) had achieved their own gravitational pull with the same kids and same bands in faithful orbit. Perhaps this over-saturation, together with the emergent “14yr old girl ska fan” that was parasitic on and offensive to the Old-Schooler, sent The Scene into oblivion. Or maybe it was because people went to college and Spring Heeled Jack had a video on MTV. Who knows. The point is that there was a ton of musical energy in CT at that time. A number of CT bands were objectively stellar (BiG MiSTAKE, SHJ, Spicy Griblets, Jasta 14) and various clubs would pack in hundreds for a good show.

But we were also young. The strength of that scene was built partly on boredom, the need to distance ourselves both musically and socially from our peers, and the fact that we weren’t allowed to drink in bars. In so far as current underground shows in Hartford and CT target people in their twenties and thirties (folks for whom these factors are generally absent, I take it) it will be difficult to generate a lot of momentum (especially at dry venues). This by no means justifies the low turn out at the Cultural Center, but it may go some way in explaining it.



As far as Hartford is concerned, it seems that the city has always been more bar-driven than indy-music driven. Note, for instance, that none of the aforementioned clubs are (or were) in Hartford. Rather, kids had to travel to Willimantic or sketchy parts of New Britain to see a show. Which brings me to an anecdote. The first real show that my band played was at a bar called Scarlett O’ Hara’s (now Vaughan’s Public House) which was on Pratt St., Hartford. There were no “scene kids” there of course, only a smallish crowd of seasoned drinkers. If they listened at all it was only superficially: they were getting drunk, and our young age together with our being perched up on this attic-like floor must have presented us as a novelty act. Such was my early experience of the Hartford – Indy music disconnect. Nor did it help that our parents drove us to the bar! Our drummer’s dad sat in the back of the bar and drank milk. Yes – milk.